


comprimario

by buttface



Series: cabaletta [1]
Category: Show By Rock!! - All Media Types
Genre: Bitterness, Emotions, Exes, M/M, Memories, POV Second Person, POV Second Person: Rom, Scents & Smells, Sweat, brief fade to black
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-04
Updated: 2020-04-04
Packaged: 2021-03-01 09:07:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,296
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23468893
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/buttface/pseuds/buttface
Summary: They say smell is the sense most closely linked to memory, and Rom remembers Amatelast more than he would like.*You miss the sweat, the honesty of it. You don’t know what else was real but the sweat was, the glistening of his cheeks,  the damp strands of hair sticking together as the show went on, the droplets falling from his chin after. Not even he could pretend to sweat.
Relationships: Rom/Shu Zo (Show By Rock!!)
Series: cabaletta [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1688323
Kudos: 10





	comprimario

What you remember most viscerally about Amatelast, long after the sudden silent snap of it ending, is the sweat. 

It was those dark, close bars you always played, muggy and smoky and uncomfortable, even after you peeled your shirt off so the sweat could try to evaporate from your skin. The feel of it, first a warm prickle, then full droplets trickling down your face, rivuletting across your chest to attempt to cool your heaving muscles. How you'd always have to tape up your hands to keep the sticks from slipping and wash the spray off your drums after. The feel of it, sticky and warm but joyous, too, cleansing, everything inside of you coming out through the music. You left nothing in reserve on those nights.

And there was him, in those dark, heavy layers he insisted on wearing as if he wanted to sweat harder. It wasn’t so visible on stage against the already black of his clothes, not like the bare glisten of yours, but you would have sworn you could smell it carried in the air. You were so proud of him, how hard he worked, every move he made as you watched his back. 

You’re afraid you’ll never be able to forget the smell of him, the cologne he used and the base notes of him underneath. You know it came from a bottle but you can't separate it from his body, you never smelled him without it, as if his pores naturally oozed the sort of scent they sell buy-one-get-one-half-price next to the Manic Panic. 

(He has his own line of perfume now, of course. It smells nothing like he did then, but you had to find out, didn't you? Sneaking into the store to surreptitiously sniff the sample, as if anyone there would recognise you, as if he himself might crawl from the bottle and give you that look of pity.)

They must still make it because Crow wore it to practice once and your hackles were up before your conscious mind registered where you knew it from. Your eyes told you it was Crow but your nose and your heart and your body kept aching to play out old memories. You got two songs into practice before you had to beg off sick and drag yourself to that same old bar where you met the prez, where you always go when you need to drown out old songs. They use too much lemon cleanser and it’s too bright and it smells nothing like those days. You can sit there with the hurt and a beer and a plate of sausages and piece together the smells and the sounds and the feelings of now until they feel more real than the past again.

He would turn to you as the show reached its climax, just for a moment, glowing with perspiration and pride and what you naively thought was affection and you would dive into your drum solo, harder and faster like you could beat your heart out of your chest for him. You wanted him to see how hard you could work for him, skin slick with the evidence of it, effort and yearning and intention seeping out your pores. _We can do this_ , you said with every bounce of stick against drumhead, _you and me_ the crash of cymbals, and it rattled through your bones and out your skin and your smile and the light you felt pouring out of you. Surely nothing else could be as real as that moment.

You never really looked further than his back, not when the show was heaving and the music was carrying you and his voice leading the way. The audience could have been two or twelve or twelve hundred, it wouldn’t have made you play any different. You never wondered what he saw before him.

You hold yourself differently now, you go to the show already part-undressed, instead of the vulnerability and exultation of pulling your shirt over your head and letting it fly. You watch the crowds, you keep track of the money. You pour your heart into your music; you know what you’re working for, what will never leave you. You love your bandmates but you know who you are to them, you smile or you shout but you don’t lose your head, not for them. They need you to keep them grounded, to know what’s real. You buy them ramen and you stop them fighting and you are the adult so that they can be who they are.

Maybe if Adam or Eve saw you now, they wouldn’t see any difference from who you were then. You know he sees in you mostly what he thinks you should be by now. What you are is what you have had to become. You are stronger, and angrier, and more dedicated, because you needed to be for your soul to stay wild.

You miss the sweat, the honesty of it. You don’t know what else was real but the sweat was, the glistening of his cheeks, the damp strands of hair sticking together as the show went on, the droplets falling from his chin after. Not even he could _pretend_ to sweat. 

(He pretends not to sweat, now, up on the huge stage with the bright hot lights blinding anyone who tries to look past the effortless facade, but you’ve seen him backstage on those unfortunate occasions when you couldn’t keep your paths from crossing. His makeup may be professional grade now but it still runs by the end of the night, and close up you can see how he’s layered it on under his eyes. He’s never changed his streaks, even though he changed his name and his voice and the way he walks, and you hate that the most, that he’s not afraid of anyone remembering Shuu enough to recognize him now.)

He always wanted to shower right after a show, even when the electricity in your veins was calling to his and he was laughing against the back of your neck as he followed you home, but sometimes you’d talk him out of it so you could breathe in more of him, lap up the damp vee of chest peeking through the layers of clothing. Slowly peel him out of his absurd sweat-sodden costume, you know that’s how vkei works but how can he _stand_ it, all those clothes, so much keeping him set apart, so much hiding. Bury your nose between shoulder and neck, inhale, hold it in, there he is, the scent beneath the cologne, the trail you could follow home, _Shuu, Shuu_ , like breathing, beaded in the curve of his throat, his skinny fingers tangled in your hair, his voice--

Don’t remember that, not now. He lied to you. You thought his laughter was real because he never did it on stage, only when you were alone, but it was as fake as the dreams he gave you. He had one voice when he sang, and the one he whispered in your ear, and the one you hear everywhere now, even in the bar where you go to sit with the absence of him, and you can’t trust any of them. You don’t know what he wanted, but apparently it wasn’t you.

Leave your younger self there, in the rain. Let it wash away the tears, the sweat, the promises he still wants to keep. Someday you’ll have to forgive him for believing the evidence of his senses, for thinking he can share a dream. He didn’t know any better, not like you do. Let him be happy, for what time he had to be happy. Let him enjoy the swell and beat of his not-yet-broken heart.

He’s never coming back.

**Author's Note:**

> Rom does not take break ups well! You should not take his opinions on Shuu too literally. He is not exactly interpreting the past with a generous eye here.
> 
> I have no idea if anyone will even read this but I am hooked on second person emotion/sensory dumps, sorry. I kept looking at pictures of Amatelast and what sweaty, sweaty boys they were. How good is a jaguar's sense of smell actually? I have no idea. If even I can get emotionally fucked up by the smell of the laundry detergent my ex used, then a myuumon probably has a lot of emotional compromise to deal with.
> 
> ngl in my heart I still want to do a Shuuzo apologia as well. He just wants to make people happy!! You had one single and it was his breakup song to you I don't know how this came as a surprise to you Rom


End file.
